BAGHDAD, Iraq – Two of the three U.S. soldiers missing since a May 12 ambush south of Baghdad are believed to have been alive as recently as Friday morning, but the third might be dead, the military said Saturday.

The fate of the men has been the focus of a huge dragnet by U.S. troops, who have detained more than 700 people for questioning in and around Al-Yusufiyah, a market town 10 miles south of the capital.

Information obtained from the detainees and other sources has provided a clearer picture of the ambush, but the military still does not know the men’s fates definitively, the top U.S. commander in Iraq said in an interview with Army Times published Saturday and confirmed by a spokesman, Col. Steven A. Boylan.

Gen. David H. Petraeus told the newspaper that the military had identified the person chiefly responsible for the abduction of the three men and the killing of four other soldiers and a translator.

“We know who that guy is,” the commander said. “He’s sort of an affiliate of Al-Qaida. He’s the big player down in that area. We’ve tangled with him before.”

The missing are Pfc. Joseph J. Anzack Jr., 20, of Torrance; Spec. Alex R. Jimenez, 25, of Lawrence, Mass.; and Pvt. Byron W. Fouty, 19, of Waterford, Mich. It is not known who among them might be dead or alive, Boylan said.

As the hunt for the men continued Saturday, the military announced the deaths of five other soldiers, the corpses of 55 Iraqis were found across the country, and British Prime Minister Tony Blair made a lightning visit to the country that was marred by violence.

Boylan said no one has contacted authorities to provide any proof that the missing soldiers are alive or to try to negotiate terms for their release. He would not reveal the source of information for Petraeus’ remarks.

In the latest deadly attack against U.S. forces, one soldier was killed and three were wounded Saturday when their patrol was struck by a roadside bomb south of Baghdad.

The military announced the deaths of four other soldiers who were killed Friday. One was struck by small-arms fire south of Baghdad, another was killed in combat in Al-Anbar Province, and two others were killed by a roadside bomb and small-arms fire in northwest Baghdad. The deaths raise the number of U.S. forces killed in Iraq to 3,415, according to the Web site icasualties.org.

In various areas menaced by sectarian death squads, dozens of corpses were found on the streets with signs of torture and execution-style shootings Saturday. Twenty-one were found in Diyala province, 20 in Baghdad, seven in Khalis and seven in Muradiya.

A mortar shell landed in the capital’s “green zone” as Blair, who leaves office next month with his poll ratings damaged by the unpopularity of the war, paid a visit Saturday. The attack slightly injured an Iraqi.

In a news conference, Blair said good news in the country was being obscured by disproportionate attention paid to the car bombs, mortar fire and attacks.

Blair repeated that he saw “real signs of change and progress” in Iraq but declined to be specific, deferring to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki when he was challenged by reporters. The Iraqi leader cited Al-Anbar province, where Sunni sheiks have given their support to the U.S.-Iraqi security plan for the region, and Kurdistan in the north, where he said the number of car bombs has dropped “from 10 to 14 before, and to two to three a day now.”

Maliki acknowledged that the violence in the country remains extreme, and he blamed extremists “being financed from abroad and those who want this government to fail.”

Behind closed doors, Maliki told Blair of concerns that other political powers might be working toward a coup in Iraq, but Blair reassured him that neither Britain nor the United States would support such a move, according to a source privy to the talks.

Britain has almost completed the process of pulling about 1,600 troops out of Iraq, leaving a force of around 5,500 based mainly on the fringes of the southern city of Basra, which Blair also visited Saturday.

Blair vowed that British involvement in Iraq would continue after his departure.

More in News

The city’s lawsuit in a California court accuses Equifax of violating state law by failing to implement reasonable security measures and not providing timely notice of the breach. It seeks tens of millions of dollars in civil penalties as well as restitution for some consumers.

BERKELEY — The leader of an “alt-right” group based in Vancouver, Washington, is set for a 2 p.m. rally at Sproul Plaza at UC Berkeley despite the cancellation of Free Speech Week events that were planned by a conservative student group and political provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos. Joey Gibson, the self-styled leader of Patriot Prayer, said in a video he posted...